Skip to main content

Not by cattle class! Why should an MP suffer for demanding to fly Business Class on an All-Economy flight?

By Anand Mazgaokar*
The biggest crisis of the year 2017 -- something that caused turmoil in Parliament, Government, ruling alliance -- has been "resolved". The astuteness, accommodativeness, ability to find ‘middle ground’, of our politicians has "saved" the day.
The question is did a Member of Parliament really thrash an airline employee? Did he only brag about it? Did he both, thrash & brag? A Commission of Inquiry should be set up. Of course, when an elected ‘People’s Representative’ thrashes a commoner 25 times with his slippers, it should not be automatically assumed that the violent MP is the offending party!
May be, after 2014 a 56 inch chest is no single individual’s monopoly. Others have also started going around with inflated chests. The only people who don’t have 56 inch chests are hapless party spokespersons who, on TV, have to both, condemn goon-like behaviour and at the same time not disturb the ruling alliance applecart.
The cardinal rule to be safe while committing crime in India is to do it as part of a mob, or be assured of political patronage. Ideally both. Ask all rioters. Ask Gau rakshaks. His crime was doing it all alone and while someone’s camera was on. Therefore, the most important question here is why did the MP land in this soup? Was it inexperience? Was it overconfidence? Or, was it knowledge that he and his party would be able to bargain their way out of this?
The MP must have had a very stressful time. His party dithered. It was in two minds. They almost pulled him up for his behaviour. But that would have been so out of character. They soon realised that and found their feet and voice in Parliament and came out with all guns blazing. Everyone who knows them and their track record must have heaved sigh of relief.
The poor MP has already undergone untold hardship and punishment without trial. He was barred from flying by all airlines, he’s had to make train journeys multiple times, cartoonists are having a field day, some even showed him flying on slippers. He’s even had to charter a plane to go to Delhi.
There doesn’t seem to be a Patanjali Airline which would have been a law unto itself and given the MP his due. Unfortunately, the Patanjali folks only manufacture toothpaste, biscuits, shampoo, soaps etc., thus far. 
As far as one can tell they haven’t diversified into aircraft manufacture, airline running or managing airports. In the absence of competition from Patanjali the other airlines have all ganged up against a People’s representative licenced by elections to wanton behaviour.
MPs having to fly cattle class is such a travesty. And, by the way, it wasn’t the offending MP who invented the cattle class, it was actually established by a certain Shashi Tharoor. No other human being on earth should suffer such ignominy for just demanding his right to fly Business Class on an all Economy flight!
MPs truly have, and must have special privileges. There’s no way they can be treated as common citizens. If rioters are not acted against, if mob-violence is legit, if ‘gau rakshaks’ go scot free in spite of what they do, if Dalit-atrocities are okay how on earth can an MP be targeted ?
The poor MP and his party’s plight didn’t end there. They had to drag Mr Mohan Bhagwat in and float the balloon of supporting him as President. Mr. Bhagwat, as the President of India because an Air India employee was beaten with slippers! That one would be for the annals of politics! In any case sensible, rational people do not make sense in this day and age.
But, the MP and his party need not have stressed themselves so much. A deal with the senior partner was inevitable. They’re so intertwined. They need each other in the Mumbai Municipal Corporation. They cannot do without each other in Maharashtra Assembly. Not in Delhi either. The senior partner needs them for Presidential elections. Sharing a genetic code and long marriage does bestow advantages.
If they were still not assured of a deal Mr Donald Trump was at hand. He offered his good offices to mediate between India & Pakistan. The Govt could have struck a package deal with Mr Trump and got him to mediate between the alliance partners too.
Anyone who fears that change will come about, that there is danger of Indian polity being civilised and rule of law being applied at all times and in all cases must rest assured that the Government and if need be, the Speaker will intervene and restore status quo. Amen.

Comments

TRENDING

Insider plot to kill Deendayal Upadhyay? What RSS pracharak Balraj Madhok said

By Shamsul Islam*  Balraj Madhok's died on May 2, 2016 ending an era of old guards of Hindutva politics. A senior RSS pracharak till his death was paid handsome tributes by the RSS leaders including PM Modi, himself a senior pracharak, for being a "stalwart leader of Jan Sangh. Balraj Madhok ji's ideological commitment was strong and clarity of thought immense. He was selflessly devoted to the nation and society. I had the good fortune of interacting with Balraj Madhok ji on many occasions". The RSS also issued a formal condolence message signed by the Supremo Mohan Bhagwat on behalf of all swayamsevaks, referring to his contribution of commitment to nation and society. He was a leading RSS pracharak on whom his organization relied for initiating prominent Hindutva projects. But today nobody in the RSS-BJP top hierarchy remembers/talks about Madhok as he was an insider chronicler of the immense degeneration which was spreading as an epidemic in the high echelons of th

'Flawed' argument: Gandhi had minimal role, naval mutinies alone led to Independence

Counterview Desk Reacting to a Counterview  story , "Rewiring history? Bose, not Gandhi, was real Father of Nation: British PM Attlee 'cited'" (January 26, 2016), an avid reader has forwarded  reaction  in the form of a  link , which carries the article "Did Atlee say Gandhi had minimal role in Independence? #FactCheck", published in the site satyagrahis.in. The satyagraha.in article seeks to debunk the view, reported in the Counterview story, taken by retired army officer GD Bakshi in his book, “Bose: An Indian Samurai”, which claims that Gandhiji had a minimal role to play in India's freedom struggle, and that it was Netaji who played the crucial role. We reproduce the satyagraha.in article here. Text: Nowadays it is said by many MK Gandhi critics that Clement Atlee made a statement in which he said Gandhi has ‘minimal’ role in India's independence and gave credit to naval mutinies and with this statement, they concluded the whole freedom struggle.

Modi govt intimidating US citizens critical of abuses in India: NY Christian group to Biden

Counterview Desk  the New York Council of Churches for its release of an open letter calling on the Biden administration to “speak out forcefully” against rising Hindu extremist violence targeting Christians and other minorities in India. In the letter addressed to President Biden, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, and other major elected officials, the NY Council of Churches expressed "grave concern regarding escalating anti-Christian violence" throughout India, particularly in Manipur, where predominantly Christian Kuki-Zo tribals have faced hundreds of violent attacks on their villages, churches, and homes at the hands of predominantly Hindu Meitei mobs.

Green revolution "not sustainable", Bt cotton a failure in India: MS Swaminathan

MS Swaminathan Counterview Desk In a recent paper in the journal “Current Science”, distinguished scientist PC Kesaven and his colleague MS Swaminathan, widely regarded as the father of the Green Revolution, have argued that Bt insecticidal cotton, widely regarded as the continuation of the Green Revolution, has been a failure in India and has not provided livelihood security for mainly resource-poor, small and marginal farmers. Sharply taking on Green Revolution, the authors say, it has not been sustainable largely because of adverse environmental and social impacts, insisting on the need to move away from the simplistic output-yield paradigm that dominates much thinking. Seeking to address the concerns about local food security and sovereignty as well as on-farm and off-farm social and ecological issues associated with the Green Revolution, they argue in favour of what they call sustainable ‘Evergreen Revolution’, based on a ‘systems approach’ and ‘ecoagriculture’. Pointing ou

Link India's 'deteriorating' religious conditions with trade relations: US policymakers told

By Our Representative  Commissioners on the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) raised concerns about the “sophisticated, systematic persecution” of religious minorities by the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi at a hearing on India in Washington DC.

Buddhist shrines were 'massively destroyed' by Brahmanical rulers: Historian DN Jha

Nalanda mahavihara By Our Representative Prominent historian DN Jha, an expert in India's ancient and medieval past, in his new book , "Against the Grain: Notes on Identity, Intolerance and History", in a sharp critique of "Hindutva ideologues", who look at the ancient period of Indian history as "a golden age marked by social harmony, devoid of any religious violence", has said, "Demolition and desecration of rival religious establishments, and the appropriation of their idols, was not uncommon in India before the advent of Islam".

Swami Vivekananda's views on caste and sexuality were 'painfully' regressive

By Bhaskar Sur* Swami Vivekananda now belongs more to the modern Hindu mythology than reality. It makes a daunting job to discover the real human being who knew unemployment, humiliation of losing a teaching job for 'incompetence', longed in vain for the bliss of a happy conjugal life only to suffer the consequent frustration.

A Hindu alternative to Valentine's Day? 'Shiv-Parvati was first love marriage in Universe'

By Rajiv Shah*   The other day, I was searching on Google a quote on Maha Shivratri which I wanted to send to someone, a confirmed Shiv Bhakt, quite close to me -- with an underlying message to act positively instead of being negative. On top of the search, I chanced upon an article in, imagine!, a Nashik Corporation site which offered me something very unusual. 

Why is green revolution harmful for nutrition, food safety, environment, climate change

By Bharat Dogra*  A lie repeated a hundred times will not turn a lie into a truth. The big media should realize this and stop perpetuating the lie of the green revolution saving India from hunger, long after the world has awakened to the reality of how harmful the green revolution has been from the point of nutrition, food safety, environment and climate change.

Alarming Odisha arrests, 'illegal' detentions ahead of Vedanta bauxite public hearing

Counterview Desk  More than 80 lawyers, legal academics and researchers have written to the Governor of Odisha raising concerns about the “alarming arrests and illegal detentions” of about two dozen persons from Rayagada district in Odisha in anticipation of the upcoming public hearing for the Sijimali bauxite mine proposed by M/s Vedanta Ltd.